I am a longtime brand guy - mostly from the client side. I write mostly about smart or foolish things that brands do. I teach branding and social media at NYU and for ThirdWay Brand Trainers. Worked in marketing for Coca-Cola, Johnson & Johnson, DoubleClick and others ...

Political Advertising Has Become A Prisoner's Dilemma

We don’t respect the politicians we elect every two years. Even as we reelect them.

The approval rating for Congress last year fell to a historically low rating of just 9%. Indeed, as Chris Cillizza at the Washington Post notes, that’s below the approval ratings in Gallup and Rasmussen polls for Lawyers and The Airline Industry (both 29%), BP during the Oil Spill (16%) and the prospect of America going Communist (11%). That’s right – Americans prefer the idea of America going communist to our current Congress! While the individual approval ratings of Democrats (34%) and Republicans (23%) in Congress are somewhat higher, they’re both still below the IRS (40%).

This wasn’t always the case: as recently as September of 1998, 55% of Americans approved of the job congress was doing and the number averaged in the 40’s between 1998 and 2002, never dropping below 36%.

So what exactly got us to this point – where trust in our own elected government is at an historic low? Some observers point to increasing polarization in the Congress. After all, redistricting has made most House races one-party affairs that allow the most passionate voters to pick the candidate. That’s how you end up with Tea Party or Occupy Wall Street-type candidates in office. But there are plenty of countries where a parliamentary system allows much more radical groups to routinely wield real power.

The real problem in America right now is simple: voters are routinely being lied to and they know it. Factcheck.org which is run by the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania collects and exposes campaign lies and distortions. Here are examples of distortions by a Democratic Senatorial candidate and a Republican congressman. Voters have a simple response to these tactics: they don’t trust either party or politicians in general. This makes elections more expensive and incumbency more perilous. It is a terrible waste of resources. So why do Democrats and Republicans knowingly fabricate things?

The answer can be found in game theory. The classic prisoner’s dilemma goes like this: two suspects are taken to interrogation rooms to be interviewed separately about a crime they’ve committed together. Each knows that if both refuse to talk, they are unlikely – but not guaranteed – to go free. Each suspect also knows that if he talks and the other suspect does not he will get guaranteed immunity from prosecution. On the other hand, if the suspect does not talk but his accomplice does, the suspect is certain to be found guilty while his accomplice goes free. If both men talk, both will go to jail, albeit for less time than if just one man talked. In the Prisoner’s Dilemma, each suspect inevitably ends up talking to avoid the worst possibility – that he will take the long prison term while his accomplice goes free. However the net outcome is the second-worst outcome – because both men talk, both go to jail.

The problem with political advertising is that in the short-term, negative advertising works. If one campaign makes things up and paints the other candidate in a negative light they are likely to succeed if the other doesn’t respond. Just as in the prisoner’s dilemma, however, the third worst outcome – where everyone goes negative reducing the voters respect for both candidates – is the one that prevails. Of course, this is not limited to advertising. The entire politico-electoral complex is devoted to using diversion and illusion on both sides to mesmerize voters – from Fox News and MSNBC to the blogosphere. Pundits speak to voters like children.

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Why the cynicism? We’re beginning to figure out that no matter who’s in power, the 1% win, they’re playing both sides against the middle. We send our children off to the war machine, the rich get richer, and the middle class shrinks. Still, Huey Long said it best: “A Democrat will hurt you, but a Republican will kill you every time.”

1) YES 2) I normally see government as a way for citizens to, as a group, push back against the excesses of the private sector. However, where do we stand when our government is the one exercising such excesses?

Given the options of: A) The truth that, “If I am elected nothing will change because the system is so huge and controlled by special interests that it is highly unlikely that I (the candidate) can make a difference without a large, unified backing from you, my constituents, and possibly some short term pain for some long term gain.” or B) some good old fashioned, “news making”, mudslinging, we as a people chose B.

Some equilibrium is achieved with this choice. We as citizens can feel good about voting and we are relieved of our responsibility to hold the elected officials responsible for their promises because “they are all a bunch of dirty liars anyway”.